Notes from a class

Notes from a class

So, I just completed a series of lectures that I gave to some Producing classes at the New York Film Academy. Over four sessions, we discussed the changing trends in distribution, festivals, and social networking. I learned as much, if not more, from them than they probably learned from me (though it was nice to instill such important subjects as “day-and-date,” “ancillary,” etc.). I wanted to learn about the ways this younger generation of tech savvy, film-consuming adults chose which films they were paying for. And here are some highlights of what I learned:

– Netflix seems to be the name of the game. That was the overwhelming winner when I took a poll of how the students watched movies most often. Many of them also touted how much they utilize Netflix streaming.

– Some of the students seemed to not realize (or care) that their second favorite online film sources, MegaVideo and Watch Movies, are usually giving them illegal bootlegs. And, charging them for it, too.

– Hollywood films they are looking forward to seeing: Crank 2 and Wolverine.

– Metadata is the key to getting their attention for a film. When deciding to watch a film they’ve never heard of, they base decisions on genre, cast/crew, and recommendation algorithms.

Curious about the discussion about downloading illegal content (whether it was the sites u mentioned or even Wolverine) … did anyone have any issues if it was their content … or do they simply believe that illegal downloading of content is here to stay and potentially beneficial to a film?